Coming to work at The Reader before our first issue in March 1994 meant heading to a 2-bedroom loft at Alahambra Apartments on 49th & Dodge Sts., preferably after its newlywed residents were up and the boundless husky pup had been taken for a walk. That route took me right by one of Omaha's first gas stations, at the time being transformed into vegetarian restaurant icon McFoster's, a flurry of...

The remote farming community of Murdock, Nebraska, seemed to be the least likely setting for one of the heartland’s most ruthless and bloody double murders in decades. In fact, the little town had gone more than a century without a single homicide. But on the night of Easter 2006, Wayne and Sharmon Stock were brutally murdered in their home. The murders garnered sensational frontpage headlines...

When Terence "Bud" Crawford defends his WBO lightweight title June 28 at the CenturyLink Center, he'll fight for himself, his tight-knit family and a boxing community that's not seen anything like this since 1972.

Forty-two years ago heavyweight champion Joe Frazier came to town to battle local Great White Hope Ron Stander. Omaha was thrilled to host boxing's ultimate event, but Stander never...

Editor’s Note: In anticipation of Maya Angelou’s planned June 9 appearance in Omaha, Walter V. Brooks of the Omaha Star had the opportunity to interview the cultural icon. Angelou passed away May 28. This was one of her final interviews.

The words “icon” and “living legend” are thrown about America with such frequency now, they’re all but meaningless. But Dr. Maya Angelou, 86, represents a span...

The University of Nebraska at Omaha has a veritable folk-hero in its midst in hard-throwing senior softball ace Dana Elsasser, who's overcame serious challenges to become a pitching phenom. With her near legendary career fast nearing its end, fans have only a few chances left to catch her in action.

In her No. 1 pitcher role she'ill get the ball at least twice in this weekend's (April 25-26)...

As state senators assembled for the second, shorter, 60-working-day session of the 103rd Nebraska Legislature on January 8, 2014, many observers expected that tax reform and Medicaid extension would be high on the list of priorities, as they had been since the body had adjourned the previous June.

Dreamers from Neb., as from everywhere else, have flocked to Hollywood since the motion picture industry's start.

Softening the harsh realities of making it in Tinsel Town's dog-eat-dog world, where who you know is often more vital than what you know, is the mission behind the Nebraska Coast Connection. This networking alliance of natives already established in Hollywood or aspiring to be...